AIG box clever trial

_Kaiser_

It's gas how many posters here seem to think that allowing a cartel of Irish insurers direct access to their driving behaviour would somehow result in cheaper insurance - have ye not read the Insurance quotes thread where people with flawless records have seen their premiums hiked significantly this year? All this would do is give them even more of a reason to do so, given the apparently random and often nonsensical criteria they use now, and you can be sure that in the event of a claim they'll use whatever they have to deny or reduce a payout at your expense.

What's needed to reduce insurance costs is Garda enforcement of more than just "speeding" or tax checks and Government action to tackle the legal costs and compo culture.. but I guess there's just lots of people in Ireland who view "1984" as an instruction manual.

mgbgt1978

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

It's gas how many posters here seem to think that allowing a cartel of Irish insurers direct access to their driving behaviour would somehow result in cheaper insurance

lismed wrote: »

A friend of mine has just got his first insurance on a car with the AIG box clever trial, he's a 24 year old with a provisional license with no driving experience. His insurance cost 2 grand less than any other company would quote him.

Well the OP sems pretty convinced that a "Black box" saved their friend 2 Grand.....and no mention of a Cartel, just the one Insurer.

jimgoose

I don't think much of these yokes either. Does anyone know what exactly they measure, record and report? I suspect it's yet another bunch of hokum design to nicely exploit Paddy's natural forelock-tugging toppademorninyeronnersorr aspect.

H3llR4iser

catmack wrote: »

Well, what is the problem with it if you aren't doing anything wrong?

Allinall wrote: »

Hi catmack,
Once you don't drive like an idiot you have nothing to worry about.
I think there's a lot of slightly paranoid people here. -:)

You have a lot to worry about, and to be frank, direct and rude, people giving into this "blackbox" malarkey are just naive.

The insurance market is in the state due to a lot of things, including disproportionate payouts for minor and sometimes imaginary injuries, but one of the key elements is that there are no controls, no checks and most importantly, no transparency. Ask them about what makes a driver or a car more a risk than another and to see the data, and they say "business secret!".

In this scenario, they can do whatever they please and decide on the "parameters limits" of their blackbox as it fits them. Most likely, right now those devices are relatively forgiving, but give them time and adoption and when everybody will be showin up as a "very safe driver" on their screens, the parameters will be stricter and stricter and stricter - until it's effectively impossible to get a "pass" score.

And before anybody objects, yes it would be legal. They report to nobody. They do provide a service that is a legal requirement but there are no laws regulating it - therefore it's a private business and they can do whatever they please with their service characteristics.

Kopparberg Strawberry and Lime wrote: »

The owner of aig doesn't give a flying **** if your in bray enjoying the sun or on leeson street after midnight looking for fun

He doesn't, however the quick-but-stupid-as-a-doornail software that makes the calculations does. Driving home at 3 AM? DANGER! Premium hike. And note, the software will have no idea if you have been boozing or were putting some extra time to finish that project before the end of the quarter. It only knows "night driving = dangerous" and applies its directives.

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

It's gas how many posters here seem to think that allowing a cartel of Irish insurers direct access to their driving behaviour would somehow result in cheaper insurance

They can't figure out how the blackbox system only seems to work against the companies; If everybody had one, drove like old ladies and showed up as "very safe" in their DBs, they'd theoretically collect very low premiums - a disaster, because those premiums don't just pay for road claims, they go into the big cauldron that pays for the plane that crashed in Tangikistan, the building that crumpled in Buenos Aires and the dole scrounger suing Tesco for smashing his drunken face in the dog food shelf.

They give competitive prices now in the hope everyone gets it, so that they can put prices even higher when they are mainstream. It's a common marketing tactic - make something into a necessity for people by giving it away cheap, then start raising the price to rack in profits.

jimgoose wrote: »

I don't think much of these yokes either. Does anyone know what exactly they measure, record and report? I suspect it's yet another bunch of hokum design to nicely exploit Paddy's natural forelock-tugging toppademorninyeronnersorr aspect.

Anybody with a small bit of experience in engineering will tell you one thing: they can measure jack sh1t. Basically, all they can get is speed, G Forces, time, distance and location; All of it with a high degree of inaccuracy and completely decontextualized - you are driving 50 km/h, child runs away from his/her mom and darts in front of you from behind a parked car, you slam the brakes - DANGEROUS DRIVING! LUNATIC! Same with an animal crossing, or the old dear pulling off a stop sign 25 meters ahead of you. Every single driver will have multiple such events in a year, and be sure they'll lead to a hike.

Ridiculously, they can't measure the most dangerous behaviours - breaking a red light, stop sign, even driving the wrong way; As long as you're below the limit and don't accelerate/brake abruptly, you're fine

There is a very good reason why, for example, race teams spend hundreds of thousands if not millions of Euro on telemetry technology - collecting accurate data from a moving vehicle about its and its driver's behaviour is a very difficult task. Otherwise, they'd just stick a fecking iPhone in Vettel's or Hamilton's pockets and be fine with it.

Kopparberg Strawberry and Lime

H3llR4iser wrote: »

He doesn't, however the quick-but-stupid-as-a-doornail software that makes the calculations does. Driving home at 3 AM? DANGER! Premium hike. And note, the software will have no idea if you have been boozing or were putting some extra time to finish that project before the end of the quarter. It only knows "night driving

Who said night time is higher risk ?

If anything is driving at night not safer since very little amounts of traffic, less risk of an accident, less vehicles on the road means less chance of a collision.

Less people out means less people to run over etc.

You may bring the whole drink driving thing at night up but you could be gargling all morning and drive a car too. Consuming alcohol isint just restricted to night time.

H3llR4iser

Kopparberg Strawberry and Lime wrote: »

Who said night time is higher risk ?

If anything is driving at night not safer since very little amounts of traffic, less risk of an accident, less vehicles on the road means less chance of a collision.

Less people out means less people to run over etc.

You may bring the whole drink driving thing at night up but you could be gargling all morning and drive a car too. Consuming alcohol isint just restricted to night time.

And you are right, less cars, bikes, bicycles and pedestrians to crash into.

But you are using logic, a concept insurance companies have a selective view - it only exists if it brings money in. If it points out a fault in their ways, then it doesn't apply. The do consider night driving a higher risk.

Why? Statistics, which can be bent into shape to fit any scenario. There are more crashes and more injuries happening at night, plain and simple - unsurprisingly, concentrated on Friday and Saturday nights. But they choose to ignore this detail and simply put a blanket "night time driving is dangerous". They do apply higher premiums to shift workers - even if when you're coming off a night shift, it's most likely that you are as tired as you would be leaving work at 17.30.

That's where you, and all the other supporters of the blackbox system, are being naive: you believe the insurers will behave in a moral and honest way...:D:D:D

Liam McPoyle

The whole potential for telematics presents an interesting debate and also the potential for real savings.

Driving habits have a direct effect on the potential for accidents and consequently the potential risk / exposure for insurance companies. Anyone that thinks otherwise is blinkered.

A person driving a 2l Avensis that travels 5,000km per annum in a radius of 50kms is a much lower risk than someone that drives a 2l Avensis travelling 20,000km per annum across the whole country, even if they have the same number of years claims free driving / driving experience.

That is where the real potential for the technology arises.

I can understand why someone wouldn't want it in their car. A poster above mentioned extreme speeding, braking, cornering etc saying its not the insurance companies business. If someone is consistently driving dangerously they present a higher risk, it doesn't matter how many years claims free driving you have, if you are breaking speed limits and driving like a dick then the potential for an accident is much higher, again, anyone that says otherwise is blinkered.

If people are breaking the rules of the road then of course they don't want their insurer "spying" on them, because they will rightly be charged more because they are higher risk.

If someone is driving within the rules of the road and is as careful as possible as well as covering lower mileage then they should be charged less because they are lower risk.

Having a telematics device installed would likely make people be more concious of their driving habits for fear of being penalised by their insurer, by extension that will make roads safer.

Telematics is still a very new technology and people in general have an inherent fear of anything new, particularly when it comes to a product they are legally obliged to have but for people that are lower risk there is real potential for cost savings.

H3llR4iser

Saul T Nutzz wrote: »

The whole potential for telematics presents an interesting debate and also the potential for real savings.

Driving habits have a direct effect on the potential for accidents and consequently the potential risk / exposure for insurance companies. Anyone that thinks otherwise is blinkered.

A person driving a 2l Avensis that travels 5,000km per annum in a radius of 50kms is a much lower risk than someone that drives a 2l Avensis travelling 20,000km per annum across the whole country, even if they have the same number of years claims free driving / driving experience.

That is where the real potential for the technology arises.

I can understand why someone wouldn't want it in their car. A poster above mentioned extreme speeding, braking, cornering etc saying its not the insurance companies business. If someone is consistently driving dangerously they present a higher risk, it doesn't matter how many years claims free driving you have, if you are breaking speed limits and driving like a dick then the potential for an accident is much higher, again, anyone that says otherwise is blinkered.

If people are breaking the rules of the road then of course they don't want their insurer "spying" on them, because they will rightly be charged more because they are higher risk.

If someone is driving within the rules of the road and is as careful as possible as well as covering lower mileage then they should be charged less because they are lower risk.

Having a telematics device installed would likely make people be more concious of their driving habits for fear of being penalised by their insurer, by extension that will make roads safer.

Telematics is still a very new technology and people in general have an inherent fear of anything new, particularly when it comes to a product they are legally obliged to have but for people that are lower risk there is real potential for cost savings.

There is no 1:1 direct relationship between driving habits and accidents; stating that speed and acceleration/braking alone dictate if you're going to be in an accident is a blanket statement, similar to saying "if you walk home at night, you're inevitably going to get mugged at some point". It might or might not happen, and some individuals will be more vulnerable than others due to variables other than the time of the day: one person may happen to never cross path with the muggers while another one does three nights in a row; also, an old and frail lady might be successfully mugged in broad daylight, a heavyweight boxer might never be in his entire life.

Besides the fact that those devices completely ignore very dangerous behaviours such as breaking red lights, stop signs and yield directives, which de-facto gives them an innate level of unfairness, the whole system completely ignores the most important factor influencing whether a driver is likely to be involved in a crash or not: attention and situational awareness.

There are plenty of drivers covering long yearly mileages, driving relatively aggressively, who have never been at fault for an accident in 20/30/40 years of driving; Similarly, there are a lot of "slow, calm and safe" drivers who could very well keep a tally of "things I crashed into".

A conscious, alert driver aware of the physics and mechanics of his/her vehicle, paying attention to the road and other drivers, driving a well maintained car at 160kph on a low-traffic motorway has actually much less chances to crash than a self absorbed, singing along the radio, turning around to the kids/passengers, oblivious and completely distracted driver on a non-serviced, bald-tires equipped car traveling at 120km/h on the same motorway.

I know quite a few "very safe" drivers who managed to total multiple cars in their "driving career". They're the kind who are always slow, never in a hurry but will turn to the passengers to talk, fiddle with the radio/phone/gps while driving, look at the scenery, fail to spot the stop sign and so on. One of them holds what must be a record of three head-on collisions in the last 10 years.

Insurers know about all of this very, very, very well. While the "slow, safe but distracted" driver who gets into accidents will still have penalties due to their claim history, and right now the electronic tracking system allows some companies to get business from customers who wouldn't normally fit their approved profile, if it becomes widespread it has a spectacular potential to ultimately raise average premiums for the people who actually never make claims and have long NCBs.

grogi

H3llR4iser wrote: »

There is no 1:1 direct relationship between driving habits and accidents;

The idea of such boxes is nice and seems sensible, but in reality it does not make any sense.

Why? Because the nature of the violations that influence the safety cannot really be captured by it.

It will not know if I am running the red light.
It will not know if I am not maintaining proper distance from car in front.
It will not know if I am driving the opposite direction late all the time etc...

Yet it will penalize me if I take the car to the racing track to improve my skills...

H3llR4iser wrote: »

Besides the fact that those devices completely ignore very dangerous behaviours such as breaking red lights, stop signs and yield directives, which de-facto gives them an innate level of unfairness, the whole system completely ignores the most important factor influencing whether a driver is likely to be involved in a crash or not: attention and situational awareness.

Excellent point.

Tazio

How do these boxes work on cars with multiple drivers?

Sarahkim24

Ive had this installed just over a month ago and its causing my car not to start. Ive had new battery and starter put in and still not workin it only seems to he happening since box was installed is anyone having this problem? It will start and then after its been driven if i try to start it with it in a few minutes it wont start and after leaving it sitting for awhile it will start again. Very annoyin as its so unreliable